2 Kings 21

Manasseh was 12 years old when he began to rule. He ruled Judah for 55 years in Jerusalem. His mother was Hephzibah.

He did many things that God had told the Israelites were evil. He imitated the disgusting practices of the nations that God had forced to leave the land of Canaan so that the Israelites could settle there.

His father Hezekiah had destroyed the shrines where the Judeans had worshiped on the tops of hills. But Manasseh commanded his workers to rebuild those shrines. He had his workers build altars for Baal. He also had them set up a pole for the worship of the goddess Asherah, as King Ahab of Israel had previously done. Manasseh also bowed down to the sun, moon, and stars to worship them. \*

He directed his workers to build altars {for worshiping foreign gods} and to put them inside God’s temple, even though God had said, “Jerusalem will be the place where people worship me.”

He also had his workers make altars for the sun, moon, and stars and put them in the courtyards for the priests and the people in the temple area.

He even burned his own son as a sacrifice to a false god. He performed rituals to practice sorcery. He allowed people to dig pits so they could use them try to contact people who had died. People also used those pits to try to talk to spirits that they thought could tell them things that people otherwise could not know. He did very many things that God had told the Israelites were evil, and that made God very angry. \*

He placed the pole for the worship of the goddess Asherah inside the temple building. That was the place about which God had said to David and his son Solomon, “I will make Jerusalem, and especially this temple, places where people will always worship me. I chose Jerusalem for that purpose from among all of the cities in the land of Israel.

And if the Israelite people carefully obey all my commands and all the laws that I gave to them through my servant Moses, I will not make them wander again. They will be able to stay in this land that I gave to their ancestors.”

But the people did not carefully obey God. Manasseh persuaded them to commit sins that were even worse than the sins that the people of the nations committed whom God destroyed so that the Israelites could settle in the land of Canaan. \*

God sent prophets to warn Manasseh and the people of Judah. They said,

“{God is angry with} King Manasseh of Judah because he has done disgusting evil things. They are worse than the things the Amorites did who lived in the land before the Israelites. Manasseh has also influenced the people of Judah to sin against God by worshiping the idols that he has made.

Therefore God, the God whom we Israelite people worship, says that he is going to make something terrible happen to Jerusalem and the rest of Judah. It will be so terrible that it will shock everyone who hears about it. \*

He says that he will judge and punish the people of Jerusalem by the same standards that he used to judge the people of Samaria and the descendants of Ahab. When people wipe a plate clean, they turn it over to make sure that they have left nothing on it. In the same way, God will destroy Jerusalem and make sure that there is nothing left of it.

Some of its people will survive, but he will not help them, even though he had chosen the Israelites as his special people. Instead, he will allow their enemies to conquer them and take them and all of their valuable possessions away from their land.

He will do this because his people have done things that he has told them are very evil. This has made him very angry. They have been making him angry ever since the time when their ancestors left Egypt.” \*

Manasseh also had his soldiers kill very many innocent people throughout the city of Jerusalem. He did this in addition to committing sins that influenced the people of Judah to commit sins by doing things that God had told the Israelites were evil.

The book in which the kings of Judah recorded what happened during their reigns describes further things that Manasseh did, including the many sins that he committed.

When Manasseh died, the Judeans buried him in the garden outside his palace. A man whose name was Uzza had previously owned that land. Manasseh’s son Amon became the next king of Judah. \*

Amon was 22 years old when he became king. He ruled Judah from Jerusalem for two years. His mother was Meshullemeth daughter of Haruz. She was from the city of Jotbah.

He did many things that God had told the Israelites were evil, just as his father Manasseh had done. \*

He behaved just as his father had behaved. He worshiped the same idols that his father had worshiped. He bowed down to those idols to worship them.

He did not worship God, the God whom his ancestors had worshiped. He did not behave as God has said people should behave.

Amon’s officials plotted against him. They assassinated him in his palace. \*

But then the people of Judah killed all those who had assassinated King Amon. They appointed his son Josiah to be their next king.

The book in which the kings of Judah recorded what happened during their reigns describes further things that Amon did.

The Judeans buried Amon in the tomb in the garden that Uzza had formerly owned. Amon’s son Josiah became the next king. \*